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Born in the rural district of Bahçe in the province of Osmaniye, Bahçeli attended primary school there.[4] He moved to Istanbul for his secondary education. Bahçeli received his higher education from the scientific academy in Ankara and his doctorate from Gazi University in Ankara. Bahçeli served as a lecturer for economics at Gazi University before entering political life in 1987.

In 1987, Devlet Bahçeli became a member of the board of the Nationalist Task Party (MÇP), which was officially renamed the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) during a congress on 24 January 1993. Following the death on 5 April 1997 of the founder and leader, Alparslan Türkeş, he became on 6 July 1997 the second chairman of the MHP. From 1999 to 2002, Bahçeli served as a deputy prime minister in the coalition government (DSP-ANAP-MHP) of Bülent Ecevit.

He made his most famous speech in 2009 which is the 40th anniversary of Nationalist Movement Party. The English translation is "What's in 2009? There are two zeros. 09 is in the left, get rid of it, and also get rid of the zero in 20. It will give you 29, 2 and 9. The sum of 29, 2 and 9 is 40 which is 40th anniversary of Nationalist Movement Party." [7]

In 2015 a Uighur staffed, Turkish owned Chinese restaurant was assaulted by Turkish nationalists; they also attacked the Dutch consulate, mistaking it for the Russian consulate [8][9] and assaulted several South Korean tourists, believing them to be Chinese. Devlet Bahçeli said that the attacks by MHP affiliated Turkish youth on South Korean tourists was "understandable", telling the Turkish news paper Hürriyet that: "What feature differentiates a Korean from a Chinese? They see that they both have slanted eyes. How can they tell the difference?".[10] Another translation of his remarks was : "What is the difference between a Korean and a Chinese anyway? They both have slitty eyes. Does it make any difference?"[11][12]

Also, he has stated that the Armenian Genocide was an "absolutely correct" act, referring to the 1915 events in which 1.5 million Ottoman Armenians lost their lives, and that "it should be done again if the circumstances were the same".[14][15]